My New Favorite App

Technically, my new favorite smart phone app has nothing to do with dogs. Not even by a stretch.

It’s a housekeeping app.

Stay with me.

Home Routines is basically the app version of the Fly Lady cleaning system, which it seems like everyone has heard of. The premise is that you create habits by pinning certain tasks to certain times of the day. You already do this with some of your most ingrained behaviors–brushing your teeth before bed, for instance.

The strength of Home Routines is that, while it is based on housekeeping, it’s customizable to be pretty much any routine behavior that you want. It comes pre-programmed with Morning, Afternoon, and Evening routines that are pre-filled with standard chores, plus a rotating weekly list of specific areas of your house to clean. You can change any of that, though.

Here’s a screenshot of my main page, to make this all more clear:

And here’s where it surpasses any mere list app that I’ve ever seen: it automatically resets at the time of your choosing. You can even set different intervals for different sections. I wake up every morning and see a clean slate for my daily to-dos, but my list of weekly stuff only resets on Tuesdays.

I was pretty happy with it as a reminder to do my chores, when I had what I think of as a stroke of genius.

We all say that we want to do some kind of training every day, or get in a certain number of walks a week. Saying does not equal doing, though, as we all know. Putting Silas’s relaxation protocol right there between putting away the laundry and sweeping means that it gets done more often than not. I at least look at the app several times a day (you can set reminders), which means it’s on my mind. No more “drat, it’s bedtime and I forgot to work with the dog!”

So I thought I would pass this along to you. There may be other apps out there that do the same thing, but this is the one I have.

Fine print:
Alas, nobody paid me for this. Right now the app is Apple only, but they say an Android version is in the works.